PODCAST · business
Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement!
by Graphite Connect and Candor Procurement
Welcome to Proc n Roll, where nearly 70 years of combined procurement expertise come together. Join Natasha, the PRO CPO with experience at IBM, McKesson, Salesforce, and Nike; Zach, the procurement guru from London; and Conrad, the visionary innovator behind transformational procurement at Intel and Adobe. We dive into the latest trends shaping the procurement landscape while breaking down the essential building blocks for success. Whether you’re new to procurement or a seasoned expert, our discussions will inspire you and keep you grounded in real-world value.
Episodes
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Fixing the Contract Bottleneck
Why is the procurement cycle always so slow, and why are stakeholders constantly complaining? In this week's Proc and Roll, Conrad, Zach, and Natasha tackle the biggest bottleneck in the industry: the contract and risk process. The hosts break down why forcing an ironclad contract for every…
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Mastering Career Pivots and Emotional Intelligence with Adam Lancaster
What does it actually take to rocket-ship your career, build unshakable leadership skills, and completely transform your mindset? In this week's Proc and Roll, Conrad sits down with his former Adobe colleague, Adam Lancaster. Adam shares his wild journey from surviving a mountain lion attack to...
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The 15-Day Nightmare: Why Your PR to PO Cycle is Killing Your Business
Is your procurement process holding the business back? Everyone dreams of a two-day PR to PO cycle, but reality often averages 10 to 15 days. When the process is that slow, business stakeholders will bypass procurement entirely to get things done. In this week's Proc and Roll, Conrad, Natasha…
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The Anatomy of a Great Decision: 3 Frameworks Every Leader Needs
In this week's PNR, Conrad, Zach, and Natasha roll up their sleeves to tackle one of the most critical elements of leadership: how we actually make decisions. Moving beyond high-level theory, the hosts reveal their personal, battle-tested decision-making frameworks. From using AI to analyze our…
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Everything is Rented: Leaving a Leadership Legacy Beyond Your Title
In this special in-studio jam session, Conrad sits down with Natasha Gurevich live at Graphite Headquarters. Fresh off her week at Sundance Mountain Resort for a senior leadership program, Natasha shares powerful reflections on executive integrity, the danger of corporate "storytelling," and why...
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Vibe Coding 101: How to Build Your Own Procurement Tech
In this week's Proc N Roll, Conrad and Zach dive deep into the world of Artificial Intelligence and how it is revolutionizing the way procurement professionals work. They discuss how the "language barrier" of traditional coding is gone, meaning anyone can use plain English to build complex…
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Master or Servant? Finding the Right Power Balance with AI Agents
In this episode of Proc and Roll, Conrad, Natasha, and Zach tackle one of the most critical questions facing leaders today: how should we use Artificial Intelligence in our decision-making process? The team debates the risks of "automation bias" and whether relying on AI is causing intellectual...
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From Ray Dalio to Colin Powell: The Ultimate Decision-Making Toolkit
In this episode of Proc and Roll, Conrad, Natasha, and Zach dive deep into the cornerstone of true leadership: decision-making. Drawing inspiration from Ray Dalio's Principles, Jocko Willink's Extreme Ownership, and Jeff Bezos, the hosts unpack how top leaders make the right calls when the stakes...
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Learning is More Valuable Than Earning: Navigating the Stages of a Procurement Career
In this special episode of Proc and Roll, Conrad sits down with Natasha Gurevich to reflect on their career journeys, transitioning from massive enterprise procurement leadership roles to the wild world of startup founders. Natasha reflects on her legendary career—including being Nike's first…
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The 30-Day Leadership Hack: Why New CPOs Should Always Talk to HR First
Conrad and Zach sit down with Bart Reekmans, a former Belgian Air Reserve Commando who transitioned into a powerhouse career as a global Chief Procurement Officer. With experience leading multi-billion-dollar procurement teams at GE, Suez, Honeywell, and WorldPac, Bart brings a wealth of…
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Are You Leading, or Just Managing? The Crucial Difference
Welcome to the kickoff of the Proc n Roll Leadership Series! Conrad, Natasha, and Zach pause the standard procurement talk to dive deep into the philosophy of leadership, the meaning of work, and the true purpose of life in an AI-driven future. If you've ever wondered about the real difference...
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Why Today is the SLOWEST AI Will Ever Be
Are you prepared for a future where your company rewrites its software every single night?In this episode of Proc n Roll, Zach and Natasha sit down with Sanjay Srivastava—former Chief Digital Officer at Genpact, serial entrepreneur, and founder of the Executive Technology Board—for a masterclass…
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The Biggest Mistake You're Making With Your AI Experiments
Welcome to another Jam Session on Proc n Roll! This week, Conrad sits down with Ajay Khosla from Google to dive deep into the reality of agentic procurement and enterprise AI. They discuss the rapid evolution from simple generative chatbots to powerful, proactive agents (like Open Claw) and how...
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Build vs. Buy is Officially Dead: The Surprising New Strategy Taking Over ProcureTech
In this episode of Proc n Roll, Zach and Conrad sit down with Joël Collin-Demers, the digital procurement mentor and author of the Pure Procurement newsletter. Joël unpacks the new "buy-to-build" paradigm in procurement technology, explaining how to successfully blend pre-packaged software suites...
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The Bravery of Leadership: Making the Hard Decisions in Procurement
In this jam session of Proc n Roll, Conrad sits down with Limor David-Sternfeld, a seasoned executive with a fascinating career journey that spans from the defense industry to leading global sourcing and procurement in the Bay Area's big tech sector. Limor shares her practical insights on...
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Procurement's Next Crisis: Who is Paying for All This AI?
In this week's Proc n Roll, the trio tackles a billion-dollar boardroom debate: Who exactly owns AI in the enterprise? With 87% of companies increasing AI budgets by 2026, but only 14% having a clear C-suite owner, the lack of defined leadership is creating uncertainty. Conrad, Natasha, and…
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Stop Begging for a Seat at the Table (This Fortune 500 CPO Says It's Fake)
In this week's Proc n Roll, we are joined by procurement legend John Dixon, whose 40-year career includes serving as Chief Procurement Officer for global giants like AstraZeneca, GSK, Diageo, BP, and Rolls-Royce. John drops some serious truth bombs about the current state of our industry. He...
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57 Contracts With the Same Hotel: The Visibility Problem Nobody Sees
You think you know your spend? Natasha Gurevich once found a company with 57 separate contracts with the same hotel chain — because nobody had visibility across entities. In this Proc N Roll: Track, Conrad Smith breaks down the simplest data model every procurement team needs (transactions →...
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Building Digital Twins: How AI is Reshaping the Procurement Workforce
In this episode of Proc N Roll, the "Three Amigos" reunite to tackle the wild frontier of AI in the workplace before diving deep into the architecture of procurement operating models. Are AI tools "employees" or just "agents"? The trio discusses the clash between tech developers and HR…
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Stop Hiring. Start Growing: The Procurement Talent Fix
The procurement talent crisis isn't a hiring problem — it's a development problem. In this Proc N Roll: Track, Natasha Gurevich argues that as automation replaces purchasing tasks, leaders can't expect their teams to instantly become strategic thinkers. You have to build that muscle from within....
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How to Win Over a Stakeholder Who Doesn't Want Your Help
Every procurement professional has met that stakeholder — the one who says "we're fine, thanks" and locks the door. In this Proc N Roll: Track, Natasha Gurevich shares the exact playbook she used to break into one of procurement's hardest categories: marketing. Step one: stop threatening an RFP…
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What Are We Trying to Achieve? The Shift to Outcome-Based Procurement
Welcome back to Proc n Roll! In this week's episode, Conrad reconnects with long-time colleague and procurement powerhouse Omid Ghamami to discuss a fundamental shift in how we source. Are you spending 70% to 90% of your day firefighting supplier issues? Omid argues that this happens because...
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Forget the Savings Number for 12 Months The CPO Mindset Shift
If procurement only speaks the language of cost savings, it will never be astrategic partner. In this Proc N Roll: Track, former CPO Natasha Gurevich argues that real value looks different to every stakeholder — risk reduction for legal, speed to market for marketing, capacity assurance for…
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Why Most Procurement Risk Programs Fail (And the 4 Step Fix)
Procurement teams love to talk about risk. Most of them never actually manage it. In this Proc N Roll: Track, Conrad Smith lays out the biggest failure he sees across dozens of procurement orgs every month — stopping at "awareness" and never moving to mitigation — and introduces the four-step...
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The Feedback Question That Disarms Every Conversation
Want honest feedback from your team? Stop asking people to judge you. In this Proc N Roll: Track, pro-CPO Natasha Gurevich shares the single question that transformed how she receives feedback from direct reports, peers, and skip-levels: "How have you experienced me?" Conrad Smith and Zachary...
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The True Cost of Dirty Data in Procurement
In this week’s Proc N Roll, Conrad sits down with Stephany Lapierre, the visionary founder of Tealbook. They dive into the reality of modern procurement tech: why companies spend millions on "Ferraris" (expensive systems) only to fill the gas tanks with sugar and mud (bad data). Stephany shares…
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Be an Intrapreneur: Applying Startup Principles to Procurement
Welcome to another episode of Proc n Roll! Today, Conrad sits down with Peter Teresi, founder and CEO of Certificial, to explore what it really takes to build the mindset of an innovator. Peter shares his journey from the early days of MSNBC to revolutionizing data standards in the insurance...
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The Big 50: Practical Steps to Building the Procurement Model of the Future
Welcome to a milestone Episode 50 of Proc & Roll! Conrad, Natasha, and Zachary follow up on our previous high-level discussion to give you a practical, step-by-step guide to building your procurement operating model.…
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Make vs Buy: Navigating AI Tool Development in Procurement
In this Jam Session, Natasha Gurevich and Zachary Bachir are joined by Jason Busch, founder of Spend Matters, host of the Algo Ego podcast, and a highly provocative thinker in the procurement and supply chain space.Jason explores several critical topics reshaping the industry. We dive into the...
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The Death of Procurement Middle Management (And How to Survive AI)
Are you an architect of your procurement future, or are you waiting to be replaced by it? In this week's episode of Proc & Roll, Conrad and Zachary are joined by Tomas Wiemer (former Head of Procurement at Juniper Networks) to break down exactly how AI and agentic automation are completely...
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The 16-Hour OpenClaw Obsession: Why You Need to Start Today
In this episode of Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith and Zach Bachir are joined by Kasey Smith for a deep dive into OpenClaw, a groundbreaking agentic AI tool that is set to disrupt the procurement technology stack.The team moves beyond the hype to show how accessible this technology is, even for...
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Escaping Procurement Island: Building a Global Community
Do you ever feel like you are operating on an island inside your own company? You aren't alone. In this episode of Proc & Roll, Conrad Smith sits down with Shunit Kainy to discuss the transformative power of professional networking and knowledge sharing. Shunit, who playfully describes herself as...
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Will Agentic AI Kill Orchestration Suites?
In this episode of Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich, and Zachary Bachir dive into Phase Two of Stakeholder Management while confronting the breaking disruption of AI agents. The episode kicks off with a look at shifting global tariffs and the sudden rise of "Clawdbot", an AI…
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Beyond Logic: Why Relationships are the Real Procurement Engine
"I had to learn the hard way that people's feelings really matter." That was Zachary Bachir’s candid admission about his journey from a logical "robot" to an EQ expert. It serves as the foundation for today’s deep dive into Brain Science and the "Fluff" that actually drives multi-million dollar...
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"Don't Worry, We Got It" (The $25 Million Mistake)
That was the response Natasha Gurevich’s CPO gave to a stakeholder who said, "Don't worry, we got it." It is the ultimate definition of fiduciary duty, and the perfect example of the Enterprise Mindset we discuss in today’s episode.In this week's Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich,...
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Is Your SRM Program Just Useless Theater?
Why Your SRM Program is Useless Theater? Why has Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) progressed so little in the last 20 years? And what can procurement leaders learn from the messy "divorce" between Amazon and UPS? In this episode of Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich, and...
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Lessons from PepsiCo: What a "World-Class" Procurement Team Actually Looks Like
Why do most layoffs fail? Why is the obsession with "world-class" talent actually hurting your team? And is the advice to "learn to code" already obsolete?In this Jam Session, hosts Natasha Gurevich and Zachary Bachir sit down with Lucien Alziari, former CHRO of Prudential, Maersk, and…
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"My Data Sucks!": The Hard Reality Check Most Procurement Teams Need Right Now
Everyone wants to talk about AI, but no one wants to talk about the mess in their data lake. In this episode of Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith, Zachary Bachir, and Natasha Gurevich debate the unsexy reality of data readiness. Is your organization actually ready for predictive analytics, or are…
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"You're Only as Good as Your Last Failure" : Former Meta S2P Leader Talks Credibility
Why do business stakeholders roll their eyes when you talk about "cost savings"? And why does the next generation of talent treat their career path like a video game? In this episode, hosts Zachary Bachir and Natasha Gurevich sit down with Ted Baumuller, former Global Leader of Source-to-Pay at...
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AI vs. The Experts: Who Actually Predicted the Future of Procurement?
Will Procurement Teams Shrink in 2026? It is time for our retrospective! In this episode of Proc & Roll, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich, and Zachary Bachir look back at their 2025 forecasts and lay out their bold predictions for the year ahead. We even let an AI agent grade our 2025...
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Backstage Pass to M&A: Surviving the 5-Deal-a-Month World Tour
In this Jam Session, host Conrad Smith sits down with Jay Sklar from Hub International for a masterclass in high-velocity procurement. With Hub International acquiring an average of five companies every single month, Jay has developed a battle-tested playbook for rapid integration. He shares how…
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I Love Proc 'n' Roll: The First Anniversary Special
Happy 1st Birthday to Proc & Roll! 🎂🎸 Can you believe it has been a whole year? In this special anniversary episode, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich, and Zach Bachir put aside the interview scripts to reminisce on the journey from episode 1 to 35+. What started as a random lunch in London...
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The Industrial Mindset: How to Engineer Better Indirect Procurement
"We jumped off a cliff and built the plane on the way down." ✈️ That is how Arnaud, Head of Indirect Procurement at BIC, describes the massive challenge of building a non-GMO supply chain from scratch in just 18 months. In this Jam Session, Arnaud joins Conrad to explore how an industrial...
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Start Me Up: MVK’s Guide to "Start Small, Fail Fast" with AI
"Don't let IT select the technology." 🛑That is just one of the hard-hitting pieces of advice from Michael Van Keulen (MVK), Chief Customer Officer at Green Cabbage and former CPO at Coupa, Lululemon, and VF Corporation.In this jam session, MVK joins the Proc & Roll team to break down the…
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Better, Faster, Stronger: The Power of Agentic Workflows
Can you build a fully functional AI procurement agent in just 50 hours? In this special "Show and Tell" episode, host Zachary Bachir rolls up his sleeves to demonstrate an AI intake agent he built from scratch using N8n, a low-code automation platform. Join Conrad, Natasha, and Zach for a…
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The Age of Agents: Managing "Shadow AI" in Procurement
"Just because you can build an AI agent in five minutes, doesn't mean you should use it for enterprise procurement." In this episode, Josh Earley joins the team for a deep dive into the often-overlooked but critical topic of AI governance. As employees start bringing their own AI tools to work,...
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I've Got the Power: Using AI to Even the Playing Field
What if you could automate the most painful parts of your procurement job right now? In this hands-on "jam session," Conrad is joined by David Johnson for a practical guide to using AI in procurement. David shares his incredible "origin story" of falling through a ceiling into a procurement…
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I Won't Back Down: A Leader's Guide to Courage and Overcoming the Fear of AI Disruption
As AI and automation change the procurement landscape, what skills will you actually need to stay relevant? Natasha, Conrad, and Zach break down how the profession is evolving from a narrow focus on savings to a strategic function centered on value, speed, and customer service. They provide a...
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Mr. Roboto: How to Navigate the Agentic AI Revolution in Procurement
What happens to your job when an AI agent can do 80% of your administrative work for you? In this mini jam session, hosts Conrad Smith and Zachary Bachir have a raw and forward-looking conversation sparked by the release of OpenAI's new agentic browser, Atlas. They explore how this technology…
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The CPO's 90-Day Playbook: People, Process, Systems
Veteran CPO Ash Hall joins us to give his practical advice for career progression and leadership in procurement. Ash gives us his playbook on how to navigate career changes, make an impact in a new role, and evolve as a leader. Learn how he used a detailed and actionable framework for his first...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Welcome to Proc n Roll, where nearly 70 years of combined procurement expertise come together. Join Natasha, the PRO CPO with experience at IBM, McKesson, Salesforce, and Nike; Zach, the procurement guru from London; and Conrad, the visionary innovator behind transformational procurement at Intel and Adobe. We dive into the latest trends shaping the procurement landscape while breaking down the essential building blocks for success. Whether you’re new to procurement or a seasoned expert, our discussions will inspire you and keep you grounded in real-world value.
HOSTED BY
Graphite Connect and Candor Procurement
CATEGORIES
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! have?
Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! currently has 77 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! about?
Welcome to Proc n Roll, where nearly 70 years of combined procurement expertise come together. Join Natasha, the PRO CPO with experience at IBM, McKesson, Salesforce, and Nike; Zach, the procurement guru from London; and Conrad, the visionary innovator behind transformational procurement at Intel...
How often does Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! release new episodes?
Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! has 77 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement!?
You can listen to Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement!?
Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement! is created and hosted by Graphite Connect and Candor Procurement.
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